01UndatedEvery night I cut out my heart. But in the morning it was full againMichael Ondaatje / quote ↗
02UndatedWhat is interesting and important happens mostly in secret, in places where there is no power.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
03UndatedIn spite of her desire for a contained universe, her life felt scattered, full of many small moments, without great purpose. That is what she thought, though what is most untrustworthy about our natures and self-worth is how we differe in our own realities from the way we are seen by others.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
04UndatedThe trouble with words is that you can really talk yourself into a corner. You can't fuck yourself into a corner."That's a man talking," muttered Hana.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
05UndatedThe first sentence of every novel should be: Trust me, this will take time but there is order here, very faint, very human.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
06UndatedShe had always wanted words, she loved them; grew up on them. Words gave her clarity, brought reason, shape.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
07UndatedShe had always wanted words, she loved them, grew up on them. Words gave her clarity, brought reason, shape. Whereas I thought words bent emotions like sticks in water.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
08UndatedHe knows that the only way he can accept losing her is if he can continue to hold her or be held by her. If they can somehow nurse each other out of this. Not with a wall.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
09UndatedNowadays he doesn't think of his wife, though he knows he can turn around and evoke every move of her, describe any aspect of her, the weigh of her wrist on his heart during the night.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
11UndatedI can never understand someone by his strengths. Nothing is revealed there. I can only understand people by their weaknesses.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
12UndatedAround three a.m. he feels a presence in the room. He sees, for the pulse of a moment, a figure at the foot of his bed, against the wall or painted onto it perhaps, not quite discernible in the darkness of foliage beyond the candlelight. He mutters something, something he had wanted to say, but there is silence and the slight brown figure, which could be just a night shadow, does not move. A poplar. A man with plumes. A swimming figure. And he would not be so lucky, he thinks, to speak to the young sapper again. He stays awake in any case this night, to see if the figure moves towards him. Ignoring the tablet that brings painlessness, he will remain awake till the light dies out and the smell of candle smoke drifts into his room and into the girl's room farther down the hall. If the figure turns around there will be paint on his back, where he slammed in grief against the mural of trees. When the candle dies out he will be able to see this. His hand reaches out slowly and touches his book and returns to his dark chest. Nothing else moves in the room. [298]Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
13UndatedThe Englishman left months ago, Hana, he's with the Bedouin or in some English garden with its phlox and shit.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
14UndatedJung was absolutely right about one thing. We are occupied by gods. The mistake is to identify with the god occupying you.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
15UndatedHer life with others no longer interests him. He wants only her stalking beauty, her theatre of expressions. He wants the minute secret reflection between them, the depth of field minimal, their foreignness intimate like two pages of a closed book.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
16UndatedAliganaya - 'the embraceduring an intoxicated walk'or 'sudden arousalwhile driving over speed bumpsMichael Ondaatje / quote ↗
19UndatedI once traveled with a guide who was taking me to Faya. He didn't speak for nine hours. At the end of it he pointed to the horizon and said, 'Faya!' That was a good day.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
20UndatedThe desert could not be claimed or owned–it was a piece of cloth carried by winds, never held down by stones, and given a hundred shifting names... Its caravans, those strange rambling feasts and cultures, left nothing behind, not an ember. All of us, even those with European homes and children in the distance, wished to remove the clothing of our countries. It was a place of faith. We disappeared into landscape.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
21UndatedHere. Where I am anonymous and alone in a white room with no history and no parading. So I can make something unknown in the shape of this room. Where I am King of Corners.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
22UndatedI know the devices of a demon. I was taught as a child about the demon lover. I was told about a beautiful temptress who came to a young man's room. And he, if he were wise, would demand that she turn around, because demons and witches have no back, only what they wish to present to you.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
24UndatedI am someone who has a cold heart. If I am beside a great grief I throw barriers up so the loss cannot go too deep or too far. There is a wall instantly in place, and it will not fall.Michael Ondaatje / quote ↗
